a spreading of wings, a bating of breath, a sense of something coming

Matters of Time.

With each step taken in the same direction as the last, my feet feel somehow inherently linked to success. As if just because I climb through the stairwells of my dreams, I will become something else.

I have to remind myself when stark white failures still strike me down — this is not the case.

I move in an intentional direction, yes, but against a riptide. The current draws ever out to sea. An onslaught of wind and rain slap my skin and toss white capped waves around me, battering my sides like the vessel of strategies and attempts, schemes and secret plans that I am.

We are each our own boat, tacking and jibing toward some distant island. Sometimes, we catch a good wind. Other times, we get locked in irons. Still other moments, we veer off course and crash together. Hulls smash and we’re left with leaky holes. Patching takes time. The glue of our dashed hopes has to dry before we can set out again.

My year back in the cloudy northern west has left me wary of these collisions. Weary of getting my hull smashed in. So I decided to hug close to the coast. Keep my main sails down.

For ten months, I have drifted. Listless. Searching a map other people had writ. With a compass, seemingly broke, set not to true but moral north. A needle aimed, as it turned out, at my own heart.

I am coming to the end of that route. The edge of the distant horizon is beginning to call. And I am clipping in, preparing to set out. With the stockpiled resources I’ve got aboard, I know I have nothing to fear.

Another storm is another skill earned. Another crash is another thing learned.

I will set out come the blowing in of autumn. A cool breeze and me, going away.

Oh of course I can’t wait.

A winged thing of change I am.
I will always ride the rise and fall. The ebbs and flows. The ups and downs.

And those who miss me will always call me back.
And I will come when the winds change again.

This is how I love.
I know nothing else.
I am a craft with sails and a bird with wings, and if I didn’t move — I’d die.

For now, I prefer the shift.
In a few more weeks, I set out on a new adventure with a chin held high.